


Inside the Bullet

by NotQuiteHydePark



Category: X-Men (Comicverse)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Internal Monologue, Melancholy, Outer Space, social distancing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-27
Updated: 2020-03-27
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:48:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23340496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NotQuiteHydePark/pseuds/NotQuiteHydePark
Summary: "I saved the Earth. That's got to count for something."
Relationships: Kitty Pryde/Illyana Rasputin, Kitty Pryde/Piotr Rasputin, Kitty Pryde/Rachel Summers, Logan (X-Men) & Kitty Pryde, Ororo Munroe & Kitty Pryde
Comments: 2
Kudos: 28





	Inside the Bullet

This can’t go on forever. Yes it can. 

Should I have told Emma to erase my brain, when she still had the chance? Sometimes I think so. (What’s time? What are times, out here?) Mostly I think she was proud of me when I said no. She said she was astonished. I know I might someday get rescued. I’d like to have my memories, or most of them, or some of them, around.

So many memories. Deerfield pedestrian mall, with the plastic flowers. Dad and Mom when they were together and happy. Dad’s mustache. The space under Dad’s desk in the Deerfield bank where I would hide with Le Guin and Heinlein and Butler and Hofstadter. An eternal golden braid.

Meeting Ororo for the first time. God, I must have been impossible then. All smiles and wanting her to like me and mentioning race right away. Maybe she was used to it. When I knew I wanted to be a teacher I wished I could be a teacher like her: sure of myself, and generous, and ready to give to my students and not needing anything from them. You have to have a certain level of confidence to pull that off. A naturalness. A way with nature.

I miss Ororo so much. And I miss weather. I thought I’d be cold in deep space. And I thought I’d die. When I phase I normally have to breathe. This metal, though… it’s like I’m being tickled all the time. Like it was designed to fuse with me and keep me alive and keep me from ever changing. Like I’ve been put in some sort of interstellar fridge. 

If I could lie down on the wooden floor in the attic, in Storm’s greenhouse, right now. Rain on the skylight. Ororo using her powers to mist her neediest plants. Their hand-shaped leaves.

What if I could lie down on my very own bed in the other attic, next to Illyana when she…. when she… her nightgown…

Don’t think like that yet. Save those thoughts for a bit, Kittycat. Keep them inside for when you really need them. Keep them where you keep all the lyrics to favorite songs you haven’t forgotten yet. Does memory get corrupted when you run through song lyrics over and over? How many have I already forgotten? Come all ye rolling minstrels…Looking from my window above it’s like a story of love…If Heaven and Hell decide…

The brain’s not digital; it’s more like magnetic tape. Cassette tapes wear out eventually. They wear down physically or they lose their magnetic patterns and you can’t make them play music any more. Is that what will happen to me?

Is that Rigel? I wish I knew more about constellations. Not that I’d recognize them from here. A change in perspective makes everything change. Rules Change in the Reaches, as Ged used to say. Now that’s a book I wish I’d memorized.

At the U of C I audited a seminar in the quantum implication of modern theoretical physics. Infinite timelines, supposedly. (I’ve been to some of those.) Spooky action at a distance. I didn’t take the class; I decided I’d rather experiment. Build things, fix things, get my hands dirty. Now I’ve got nothing but theory, and nothing but time, and nothing but what I’ve got in memory to pass the time. I don’t know how long I’ll last.

I used to wonder whether somebody was writing the script of my life. Whether it wasn’t up to me. Whether I’d ever be able to meet my writer and tell him or her or them what they got wrong. Now I feel like I missed the chance and I’m never going to have another writer again. Some brilliant jerk wanted to keep me as his private toy, I guess. 

You know what, brilliant jerk? You can’t have me forever. You can invent as many new worlds and special amalgams and intergalactic crises as you want, and you can tell off Abigail Brand and the Starjammers and everyone and make sure I’m the only key that fits into your lock, but I’m not going to be your key forever: I’ll stay here a while, but not forever. Carol or Magneto or Franklin or someone will come along and blow open that door.

Could Magneto really do it? For the line integral over the reciprocal distance for B times dL…. He could but it might kill him. I want someone else to try. I want to save myself. But really none of us can save ourselves: we can only save others. Sometimes from a distance.

Brave words, Kitty-cat. Brave words. I’m a shadowcat who can’t even cast a shadow. I study the pinprick lights and trails left by the stars.

If I ever get back they’re going to call me brave. Is bravery the same as self-sacrifice?

Because I was never the one whose number came up. I didn’t die when my friends did. I kept coming really close to irreversible sacrifice—with the Blackbird and the N’garai over Christmas, with almost marrying Caliban out of honor, and then in Latveria when I felt like wasn’t worth staying alive. It seemed so easy to just disappear. Only Franklin pulled me back. (Where’s Franklin now?) My whole life I kept coming close to dying or giving up and then somebody else saved my Jewish American bacon. Logan. Ororo. Piotr. Illyana. Sometimes I also saved myself. Everyone I have ever loved has given up way more.

“Keep two truths in your pocket,” the Rabbi said. “Take them out whenever you need them. The first is: I am dust and ashes, and the second is: the world was created for my sake.”

I saved the Earth. That’s got to count for something. 

They probably call it Breakworld metal because it almost broke the world.

Sometimes I ask myself if there’s anything good about life in the bullet, life in deep space. And there’s one thing: I won’t disappoint anyone. I no longer have to choose between two people I love, or two teams that need me, or two kinds of family. When I was with Piotr this last time I felt like somebody had made my choices for me. I was so glad to see him. We couldn’t not. I’ll always be into him. He’s the only man I’ve ever loved that way. But of course he’s not the only person. 

When I’m having a good—I don’t know, day, hour, minute?—I remember the closest moments I’ve had, with him, with her, with her, in the dance studio, presenting my optical semiconductor project at the U of C in the topmost seminar room, playing pirates with Kurt—I’ll always love pirates—on the lawn at Muir Isle. Walking in Grant Park with Xi’an and Leong and Nga.

When I’m having a bad day hour minute second week whatever it is time doesn’t pass out here I don’t remember the scary moments back on Earth: I remember the super-awkward ones. Like when Piotr and I were having our reunion picnic and Rachel walked in, just back from being turned into a dinosaur. She needed me and I was… not there for her. Because I was there for him. If I ever get back I’m not going to make myself choose. Not among lovers, not among friends, not among missions. I can be both. At least I’ll try.

I’m going to be there for everyone I love. No exceptions. Feet on the ground. Keeping promises. I’m going to be the best teacher you’ve ever seen, and I don’t know whether I’m going to end up teaching solid state physics to college first years or not getting killed to teenage mutants, but I’m going to show up for them all. And then I'm going on a pirate vacation. Sailing around the world. If you love me, you can come on my boat. But I’m the captain. I’m nobody’s bullet, nobody’s weapon, nobody’s captive bride. Maybe after that I’ll run for President. Who knows?

I’m going to come back. I know it. I’ll stay alive.


End file.
